The Oklahoma City Thunder were never going to replace James Harden. Even the sunniest post-trade optimists—who pretzeled themselves to argue that the franchise was better suited keeping Serge Ibaka and using Harden to bring in some depth—dispensed with that hope as soon as the hirsute guard dropped 82 points in his first two games with the Rockets. In hindsight, we now know that Harden is a singular scorer, but we knew even in the fall of 2012 that he had something the Thunder wouldn’t be able to find elsewhere.
They bet that they could suffer the loss of what Harden provided and improve in other ways. That was the official explanation, anyway. A more credible theory posits that owner Clay Bennett skinflintishly refused to pay the luxury tax in service of holding onto one of the best guards in the league and keeping a near-championship squad intact. Regardless of the motivations and reasoning involved, the Thunder lost the trade. They’ve been trying to cope with its consequences ever since.
For four seasons, the Thunder haven’t had a shooting guard who could do all the things they want him to be able to do. They received Kevin Martin and Jeremy Lamb from the Rockets in the Harden deal, and Martin immediately took over Harden’s sixth man spot, splitting time at the two-guard with Thabo Sefolosha. If only the Thunder could have melded the two players together, they would have had their ideal Harden substitute, but both Martin and Sefolosha were frustratingly limited in their own ways. Martin could drive and shoot, but couldn’t stay in front of anyone. Sefolosha was a capable defender, but only a spot-up threat on the offensive end. Together, they patched the void Harden left behind about as well as anyone has since, and the Thunder won 60 games with their help. What sunk OKC that year wasn’t Sefolosha or Martin, but Russell Westbrook tearing his meniscus in the first round of the playoffs. Without Russ, they fell to the Grizzlies in the Western Conference Semis.
The Thunder let Martin walk in the summer of 2013 and their shooting guard play turned ugly the following season. Sefolosha lost his shooting touch, his three-point efficiency dropping from 41.9 percent to 31.6 percent, which made him effectively useless on offense. Reggie Jackson played a lot of point guard while Westbrook was rehabbing his knee, but upon the return of Russ he played some two-guard minutes in addition to backup point, which didn’t work because Jackson is a considerably less gifted Russ clone: he gambles defensively, wants the ball all the time, and is an awful outside shooter when not in the midst of a hot streak. Jeremy Lamb also got time at shooting guard and performed with his typical timidity, bringing little to the table besides a decent jumper. The Thunder ended the year by getting annihilated by San Antonio in the Western Conference Finals. Serge Ibaka was gimpy in that series and missed the first two games of it, but the Spurs were clearly superior.
Last season was doomed from the start, considering Kevin Durant wasn’t ever fully healthy, and the Thunder missed the playoffs for the first time since 2009. Anthony Morrow was third on the team in minutes, which is about as dissatisfying as it sounds. Morrow is a phenomenal shooter who can’t do anything else. OKC experimented quite a bit with the two-guard spot, shipping out a pouting Reggie Jackson midseason and importing swagged-out misanthrope Dion Waiters, who gamely chucked his way to a 45.5 true shooting percentage. Andre Roberson also received some burn and played some excellent defense while forcing the Thunder to play four-on-five when they had the ball. This might have been the most miserable of all OKC’s post-Harden shooting guard committees.
Which is strange to say, because the Thunder just beat the Warriors at Oracle Arena while depending on Waiters and Roberson to not get totally outplayed by Klay Thompson. They’re up 1-0 in the Western Conference Finals after a lousy shooting night from both Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook in part due to the yeoman’s work done by their pair of shooting guards, who combined for 17 points on 7-of-9 shooting with five assists and no turnovers in 51 minutes of floortime. And Thompson, who was checked for most of the night by either Waiters or Roberson, took 25 shots to score 25 points.
This isn’t to claim that the Waiters-Roberson tandem is going to fell the Warriors, but they’re showing that they might be able to do just enough to help the Thunder through to the Finals. OKC’s post-Harden history, apart from their injury issues, has been defined by their inability to get good minutes from their lesser lights, especially their shooting guards. Championship squads almost always have role players who can be depended upon. LeBron’s Heat had Shane Battier and Mario Chalmers. The Kobe-and-Pau Lakers had Trevor Ariza and the beautiful lunatic formerly known as Ron Artest. Various iterations of the Spurs have counted on Danny Green, Robert Horry and Boris Diaw.
For the past couple of weeks, Waiters and Roberson have outpaced their reputations, executing their minor jobs without much fuss or error. They won’t do this throughout the series against the Warriors. Waiters is due for a sixth man performance in which he goes 1-for-8 and gets scowled off the floor by Westbrook, and Roberson will get torched by Thompson at some point or another, because that’s what Thompson does even to great defenders. Neither player is going to be the Thunder’s Danny Green, or their Shane Battier. They’re just not quite that good, or that trustworthy. But if they can put together a few more games like they did on Monday night at Oracle, where they don’t make many mistakes and chip in a few positive plays, that can put the Thunder over the top, if Durant and Westbrook handle their superstar duties.
That last thing is the most important one, obviously. We can get a bit too deep into the weeds when studying playoff series, to the point that we accidentally suggest it will all come down to the battle of the also-rans. But to beat a world-historic juggernaut like these Warriors, the Thunder are going to need to give everything they’ve got, and that includes a significant contribution from the players manning a position that has haunted them since Harden’s exit. Waiters and Roberson have at least hinted that they’re up to the task. That’s not nothing. In fact, it might barely get the Thunder to the NBA Finals again, after four difficult, Beardless years.